One Presidential candidate wanted to start shooting Russians, but it was not Trump. Is he our best hope for peace? Picture by Nevit Dilmen on Wikimedia Commons via CC BY-SA 3.0.

I am a former Labour Party staffer. In the 2005 General Election I was employed as a Labour Party organiser in Edmonton in Enfield. Even now that I have joined the Conservatives as of 2008, I still keep in touch with some otherwise good and decent people. The election of Donald Trump has reduced many left-wingers to hysteria. Disturbingly, their distress seem based entirely on an inverted view of the actual stated policies of Trump and their preferred candidate, Hillary Clinton. I wrote this article in the hope of helping them.

What is Donald Trump’s foreign policy? Let us actually quote him (source Politico magazine, archive here). This is the kind of thing he actually says, calling for America to abandon the –

“dangerous idea that we could make Western democracies out of countries that had no experience or interest in becoming a Western democracy.”

These words are an clear criticism of George Bush and Obama. The remark is bipartisan and aimed at Republican and Democrat alike. Most importantly Trump recognises the tidal wave of blood that the Iraq war and the ongoing Syrian conflict have spread across not only the Middle East but the entire world.

What about Hillary? What does she actually say? In a Presidential debate she was clear (source CounterPunch archive here) –

“I’m going to continue to push for a no-fly zone and safe havens within Syria, not only to help protect the Syrians and prevent the constant outflow of refugees, but to, frankly, gain some leverage on both the Syrian government and the Russians.”

What impact does she believe that will have on civilians? Well, she gave this more candid account to Goldman Sachs in 2003 –

“To have a no-fly zone you have to take out all of the air defense, many of which are located in populated areas. So our missiles, even if they are standoff missiles so we’re not putting our pilots at risk—you’re going to kill a lot of Syrians.”

So a lot of people in Syria were going to die under Hillary’s proposed policy. It goes further though. Who is actually doing the flying in Syria? Well, it is actually the Russians. Under Putin, the Russians point out that when America has toppled oppressive secular dictatorships in the Middle East they have immediately been replaced by even more oppressive medieval theocratic dictatorships.

Much of Iraq is now under the sway of ISIL, well known for their enthusiasm for public executions, beheadings, heads on spikes, burnings and chopping of women’s clitorises. They are also supporters of Islamic Jihad against the west. The Russians would prefer the lesser evil.

Vladimir Putin actually tried to explain this in quite sensible, coherent, eloquent terms in an article he wrote for the New York Times in 2013. His article is here (archive here).

Hillary Clinton’s stated policy is shooting down Russian aircraft. Shooting down Russians. What are the Russians even doing in Syria? Fighting ISIL.

A current map of territory held by the competing factions in Syria. Picture via Wikimedia Commons, author Ermanarich, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Click for full size.

So to summarise the map, the red bits are the secular dictatorship, the black bits are ISIL, the green bits are US backed rebels who are affiliated with Al Qaeda and the yellow bit is some sort of would-be moderate secular state (so of course we are not funding them). There is a proper breakdown of all the factions in this conflict here.

The policy of the Obama administration in Syria has been to back Islamist rebels and Hillary’s plan for peace was to shoot at Russians. Vladimir Putin the Russian President naturally has made it clear he prefers Donald Trump and policies that do not back Islamic terrorists or risk a nuclear war between the United States and Russia.

The response of left-wingers to Trump’s election yesterday has been actual (not metaphorical) tears, wailing, tearing their hair and the final straw today was when one of them told me that the election of Trump (their words), “literally creates a risk of the end of the world” because of his, “inability to control himself”. What is wrong with these people? It is like a cult. Their reaction is not only at odds with a deep reading of history but even a superficial education like listening to their preferred candidate’s stated policies.

Look leftists, Hillary is the pro-military action interventionists, she said so. Trump is the cautious isolationist wisely aligning himself with an equally careful Russian president. He and Putin said so. As leftists bemoan Brexit, they sob because America did not vote for the woman who caused it by sending millions of Syrian refugees spilling across the Eastern borders of the EU and tipping the balance a few points against them.

Surely Trump’s position should unite a broad spectrum not only of the United States but also our society? Not all Christians may back a secular state but surely they would prefer it to ISIL or Al Qaeda? Surely they would prefer peace to intervention on the worst side of a foreign war? Secularists should logically prefer a secular dictatorship that treats women equally to ISIL.

Trump’s election is not just a victory for peace – it is something else – a change of path for the Conservative movement. For too long we have tolerated these ignorant arrogant left-wingers who lecture whilst the blood spilled by their heroes soaks their hands. I for one am no longer afraid to call it out.